SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco Recreation and Park Department (RPD) announced a three-pronged bike initiative to raise awareness for bike safety and education in support of San Francisco Bicycle Coalition’s Bike Safety and Education Week. This initiative also supports RPD’s rich tradition of providing clean, safe and fun park experiences to the public. The initiative includes a family bike rental event with ParkWide to promote bike riding, RPD bike education for children and youth, and bikeway improvement in Golden Gate Park.

“SF Rec and Park works to make it easy, convenient and fun for all our park users to get and ride,” said Phil Ginsburg, RPD General Manager. “We are excited to be part of the citywide efforts to promote bike safety and education.”

In partnership with RPD, ParkWide Bike Rentals will offer free adult or kid day bike rental when the public rents one adult comfort bike day rental throughout the Bike Safety and Education Week. ParkWide Bike Rentals complements a citywide bike share program being implemented in spring of 2012 that will include approximately 50 bike share stations and 500 bikes in San Francisco’s downtown core. The bike sharing program, led by the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), is part of a regional initiative to implement bike share stations along the CalTrain corridor in San Francisco, Mountain View, Palo Alto, Redwood City and San Jose.

Moreover, to raise bike safety awareness and advocate for bike education, RPD offers bike-related classes and programs throughout the year, including bike camps for youth and Tykes on Bikes, a program designed to teach general bike safety and traffic concepts to two to five year-olds.

And to help provide bike friendly environment in our parks, RPD staff in partnership with MTA, Bicycle Coalition and community advocates will be moving forward with a proposal for bikeway improvement with cycle tracks inGolden GatePark. The proposal was approved by the Rec and Park Commission last week. Cycle tracks are on-street exclusive bicycle facilities that are physically separated from mother vehicle traffic. This proposed project is the first of its kind inSan Francisco with bike travel space located between the curb and on-street parking, with parked cars providing a buffer between bikes and moving motor vehicle traffic. As a result, the project will not only enhance the existing bike route and will provide connection with major destinations in Golden Gate Park including the Conservatory of Flowers, De Young Museum, California Academy of Sciences, and Japanese Tea Garden as well as throughout the citywide bicycle route network.